How to Sell a Dental Practice

Which steps to take to get your practice ready to sell.

By now you have decided that selling your dental practice is the right decision for you; however, this realization raises newer – even more complex – questions about the best next step in transitions. How do you actually sell a dental practice? First, take a view from 40,000 feet in the air and talk with your professional advisors. Your CPA, Financial Advisor, and Transition Consultant are the best place to begin. Once you determine how the sale of your dental practice “fits in” with your retirement planning, you need to learn the different options that you have to sell.

Have you taken the first step and determined your practice value? A professional Practice Valuation should be completed by an experienced dental transition broker with credentials and experience in practice valuation. Once the value and sales price are determined, your transition broker will help you create marketing material to help share everything about your practice with potential buyers. Creating a Prospectus (material that shares both narrative and financial information) will be key to highlighting what makes your practice special. This material will “go to market” through the world-wide-web and should find itself promoted to buying dentists in a nationally recognized platform of listings.

The sale process can be customized for what is best for you. Maybe you want to create a “Phase Buy in” where you have room to hire an Associate for a year or so, and then sell them 50% or 100% when they are ready. Maybe a “walk away” sale is what you desire – find the right Buyer and execute a reasonable transition period – then walk away without further obligation. Group practices are becoming more popular with multiple practitioners sharing overhead and expanding hours and services. What can your practice support?

Your transition broker will help craft the best, custom exit for you. Each decision you make might create a few more that you didn’t expect. An experienced transition consultant can see these obstacles and challenges early and ensure you stay on point as the process becomes more complicated. Remember, your transition expert relies on years of experience navigating complicated transitions. Your patients may not understand every nuance of a complicated dental procedure, but they trust you, with years of specialty experience, to guide them. Your transition consultant will be committed to the same support on your journey - lean on them, and it can make all the difference.